I Created a Catfish Account on a Dating Site. Here’s What I Learned

It was crazy.

Even if you don’t plan to date ever again, I suspect you’ll find my experience here quite interesting.

For context, I loved online dating from the get-go.

Yes, there were the usual ups and downs of dating, but as a whole, it was a net positive. I also landed two consecutive relationships, the second of which is my current spouse. Yes, I met my spouse on Tinder.

This is why I’m so perplexed by the constant griping about online dating. The most universal complaint is that people have a laundry list of expectations while offering very little in return.

Specifically, I’ve always been curious about women’s complaints. So on a slow weekend night, I created a female profile on Plenty of Fish (creating a fake identity is called catfishing). I never interacted with anyone or took it any further than this. My intentions were purely for research.

I used a few pictures of an attractive woman who looked down-to-earth. I added a quick bio, and for fun, tried to write as many cliche phrases as I could that were reminiscent of the profiles I’d seen:

“I love to travel and try new things.”

“Fluent in sarcasm.”

*Paris emoji*

*airplane emoji*

I put in just enough to seem authentic. I wanted to see what came in and what the guy’s profiles looked like.

After I hit the create button. I stepped away. I came back the next day — and was stunned. The experience taught me a huge lesson that goes well beyond dating, and which is key for better living.

I don’t know how women date any of us

In my years of online dating, I’ve probably had five women initiate. I knew men tended to start the conversation, but I wasn’t expecting hundreds of messages on day one. The vast majority were sludge — worthy of the spam folder.

“Hi.”

“Sexy legs”

Author via PlentyofFish

“Hey hottie”

“Nice thick lips”

Author via PlentyofFish

There was this grotesque hyper-focus on “my” physical appearance. And the strangest “would you” messages.

“Would you date a cop?”

“Would you date a Puerto Rican?”

“Would you date a barber?”

Over and over again. There was so little thought put into these messages. There was no consideration for the image they were presenting, not the slightest concern with how a woman might perceive them. Part of me wondered if these were the same men who complain online and say all women are gold diggers and that online dating is pointless.

Now, to be fair, many of the women’s profiles I encountered weren’t exactly a highlight reel of great marketing either.

But this? This was a different level. I sat there shaking my head “no” in perpetuity, wondering how women put up with any of it. I’m surprised our population continues to grow.

If you can just be decent, you’ll be great

I’ve never rated guys in this context but it wasn’t hard to figure things out.

It was mostly no’s and an occasional, “Ah, he’s not bad.” And I suspect, that “not bad” is pretty damn good — because the bar is very low. This applied to messages too. Most weren’t much more than short thirst-bot text.

It made me so empathetic to the experience the opposite sex goes through in this dating process. It reminded me of marriage counseling, and how therapists have you role play the other person to help defuse tension and fights. I realized there were two simple steps a man who could take to improve these interactions:

1. Actually read her bio.

2. Send her a message with a question referencing something on her bio (not her looks). The question can be funny or serious. It doesn’t matter. Just show you read the bio.

Doing that puts you way ahead of most. For example, my catfish bio included the line, “testing the waters.” Of the first 50 messages, one lonely goldfish included a solitary message “So, what are the Ph levels on that water you are testing?”

Not a great joke. But it’s something — and something was an order of magnitude better than everything else.

It was apparent that most of the men weren’t looking for more than a hookup either which, in my experience, is something most females aren’t pursuing. I was also surprised, though I shouldn’t have been, by the age of some of these men. My profile was only in her mid-20’s, and the men messaging me, were in their 50s and 60s were inboxing me.

They were terrible photographers